Get excited, Dallas! You've entered the final weekend countdown hours. Soon, you'll have it all -- fancy pants art shows, mustache shaving parties, free concerts at that new Klyde Warren Park, and a bizarre rock musical about a time traveling Marie Antoinnett. Man, life is just that good.
Be a love and share this list with your adventure squad, and go ahead and click the titles for more information. I'll see you out there (I'll be the one bending the properties of time and space.)
Thursday 11.29 Mulled Wine and Shopping at the Dallas Handmade Market -- Any visit to the handmade market is a good one, but add in the need for interesting, hard-to-find holiday gifts and the promise of alcohol? Well, you can cross "Drunk-shopping" off your list.
From Runway to Driveway -- Design is a catch-all phrase that can incorporate so many avenues, from industrial to textile or interior decor. Today, an event fuses all three as a very fashionable crowd (led by local blogger/doll face, Oh So Cynthia) gathers around a guest speaker, Ford Motor Company's Senior Interior Designer Anthony Prozzi. He'll be rapping about the magic behind the design-sculpting process and he'll have local assists by Khanh Nguyen of Nha Khanh, Isabel Varela of IZAVEL and Trudy Cresswell from Saks Fifth Avenue.
Friday 11.30
Caviar -- Talk has been building about this group show, happening at the Gallery at the Fairmont, for weeks. It's a loving poke at swank living, as told through its participants Daniel Perez, Daniel Driensky and Ray Albarez. From chalk art to graffiti and photography, something here is bound to make your collar pop.
End of Movember Mustache Bash at Club ZaZa -- FINALLY. Guys, we love and support your fundraising via facial hair because cancer is terrible. But we ladies are so happy that those creep 'staches are on their way out. Seriously, we're going to make out with each of you -- just AFTER the Movember party at ZaZa. Right now, you look like a sex offender.
Walk to the Park -- Klyde Warren Park invites you to take a break from the Friday grind and enjoy an outdoor concert at our newest community haven. TownView Marching Band, King Bucks and Larry G(ee) perform at this free, afternoon showcase.
(W)hole by Dead White Zombies -- This is possibly the most fascinating blend of theater and performance art to happen in Dallas this year. Centered around a love, ripped apart at the Fall of Troy, the pair move through time and space, exploring the limits of emotion as they change form and roles. Parent/child, mentor/student and all things in between serve as a channel for philosophical unraveling. Also, I've heard there's a palm reader.
On The Eve -- This new rock musical was written right here in Dallas by Michael Federico and Home by Hovercraft's Seth and Shawn Magill. It takes a mescaline-infused look at alternative history, as Marie Antoinette commandeers a hot air balloon time machine with the help of an unlikely gang of collaborators. Detropia, at Texas Theatre -- This new documentary about the boarding up of Detroit factories and schools was created by the same folks who made Jesus Camp. It screens all weekend and it looks amazing. Saturday 12.1
Three Great Art Shows, all in Different Neighborhoods -- Sometimes I like to challenge geography to a cage match, and I plan to do that on Saturday night to take in the shows at Cris Worely (Design District), where metal sculpture artist William Cannings presents a series of inflated solids; at 500X (Deep Ellum/Expo Park), where a group show by Elaine Pawlowicz, Irby Pace and Benjamin Terry inject old artforms with fresh new life; and at the Bath House Cultural Center (White Rock Lake), for a photography series about Dallas' most endangered species: architecture.
re:Think the 2012 installment of TEDxSMU -- Big ideas. Community wrangling. Dudes with jobs. You'll find them all at this TED symposium happening at the new City Performance Hall on Saturday. Don't want to shell for a ticket? That's cool. They're also running a live feed, so you can watch the action in your pajamas. Blue Yule at the MAC -- It's the annual holiday party and silent auction fundraiser for the McKinney Avenue Contemporary, and it's going to be major. They throw great bashes that attract some of the most interesting and lovely humans in town. Be one of them on Saturday. This party is 17 years strong.
Acrylics on Decks -- Artist David Grizzle isn't into stretching canvas. He'd rather line up skateboards for his masterworks. He's in town showing the deck art for one-night-only, so get an eyeful of his muralistic paintings; it all goes to grind at City Tavern.
Now! That's What I Call Art: Volume 2 -- Leave it to Oliver Francis Gallery to dip its art into a deep well of booty base jamz. Part group art show, part birthday bash, this major rager is set to run until you can running man no more. From the Facebook invite: "CELEBRATE like Prince, Kool and the Gang, Nikki Mirage [???], Kanye, and 2 CHAINZ would...." I'm not completely sure how a party like that would play out, but I'm pretty sure I need to tighten up my nail game before arrival.
Gallery Walk on Dragon Street -- The galleries of Dragon Street have coordinated a chillax evening for foot traffic this Saturday. Put on your comfiest, but most uncomfortable-looking shoes, and check out this month's art collections from 5 to 9 p.m. While you're there, pop over to Red Arrow Contemporary and see their show Size Doesn't Matter while it's still in rotation. You'll be happy you did.
Sunday 12.2 Stewpot Presents "Food for the Soul" -- In addition to feeding the homeless 365 days a year, Stewpot provides a pretty amazing service with its art outreach program. On Sunday you can see the boundary-less world of art in a group showing of work by Stewpot participants.
